The Day The Music Stopped

On Aug. 1, 1942, the nation’s recording studios went silent. Musicians were fed up with the new technologies threatening their livelihoods, so they refused to record until they got their fair share. This week, Evan Chung explores one of the most consequential labor actions of the 20th century, and how it coincided with an underground revolution in music led by artists like Charlie Parker and Dizzy Gillespie.

One Year is produced by Evan Chung, Sophie Summergrad, Sam Kim, and Josh Levin.

Derek John is senior supervising producer of narrative podcasts and Merritt Jacob is senior technical director.

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Sources for This Episode

Books

Absher, Amy. The Black Musician and the White City: Race and Music in Chicago, 1900-1967, University of Michigan Press, 2014.

Anderson, Tim J. Making Easy Listening: Material Culture and Postwar American Recording, University of Minnesota Press, 2006.

Attali, Jacques. Noise: The Political Economy of Music, University of Minnesota Press, 1985.

Chanan, Michael. Repeated Takes: A Short History of Recording and its Effect on Music, Verso, 1995.

DeVeaux, Scott. The Birth of Bebop: A Social and Musical History, University of California Press, 1997.

Kelley, Robin D. G. Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original, Free Press, 2010.

Kraft, James P. Stage to Studio: Musicians and the Sound Revolution 1890-1950, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996.

Lanza, Joseph. Elevator Music: A Surreal History of Muzak, Easy Listening, and other Moodsong, Picador, 1995.

Leiter, Robert D. The Musicians and Petrillo, Bookman Associates, Inc., 1953.

Myers, Marc. Why Jazz Happened, University of California Press, 2013.

Roberts, Michael James. Tell Tchaikovsky the News: Rock ’N’ Roll, the Labor Question, and the Musicians’ Union, 1942–1968, Duke University Press, 2014.

Seltzer, George. Music Matters: The Performer and the American Federation of Musicians, Scarecrow Press, Inc., 1989.

Ward, Ed, Geoffrey Stokes and Ken Tucker. Rock of Ages: The Rolling Stone History of Rock & Roll, Rolling Stone Press / Fireside, 1986.

Zinn, Howard, Dana Frank, and Robin D.G. Kelley. Three Strikes: Miners, Musicians, Salesgirls, and the Fighting Spirit of Labor’s Last Century, Beacon Press, 2001.

Articles

Austin, Mary. “Petrillo’s War,” Journal of Popular Culture, Summer 1978.

Austin, Mary. “The American Federation of Musicians’ Recording Ban 1942-1944, and its Effect on Radio Broadcasting in the United States,” North State Texas University, May 1980.

Balliett, Whitney. “Bird: The brilliance of Charlie Parker,” the New Yorker, Feb. 23, 1976.

Berliner, Jay. “Another Take on James Petrillo,” Local 802 AFM, September 2016.

Coughlan, Robert. “Petrillo,” Life, August 1942.

“Dooley & Dodo,” Time, May 10, 1943.

Gallup, George. “Petrillo Record Ban Unpopular,” American Institute of Popular Opinion, Aug. 26, 1942.

Havers, Richard. “The History Of Recorded Jazz,” UDiscover Music, Feb. 6, 2022.

“King Ludd: 1947 Model,” Washington Post, Oct. 29, 1947.

LeDonne, Rob. “‘White Christmas’ at 75: A Snapshot of the Most Successful Song In Music History,” Billboard, Dec. 20, 2017.

Mayer, Milton S. “Mussolini of Music,” Esquire, July 1937.

“Mussolinic Order,” Time, Jan. 4, 1937.

Myers, Marc. “The Silence That Sparked New Sounds,” Wall Street Journal, Dec. 26, 2012.

Peterson, Marina. “Sound Work: Music as Labor and the 1940s Recording Bans of the American Federation

of Musicians,” Anthropological Quarterly, Summer 2013.

“Petrillo Demands End of Film Recording,” Stockton Evening and Sunday Record, May 12, 1944.

“Petrillo is Victor in U.S. Court,” Associated Press, Dec. 2, 1946.

“Petrillo to Put Curb on Making of Recordings,” Associated Press, June 9, 1942.

Pruitt, John. “Between Theater and Cinema: Silent Film Accompaniment in the 1920s,” American Symphony Orchestra, Dec. 19. 1993.

“The Petrillo Law Decision,” New York Times, Dec. 4, 1946.

“The Pied Piper of Chi,” Time, Jan. 26, 1948.

Wallace, Robert. E. “Who Played It Again, Sam? The Three Pianists of ‘Casablanca’,” AFM Local 47, Oct. 1, 2017.

Audiovisual

“The Phonautograms of Édouard-Léon Scott de Martinville,” First Sounds.

Vitale, Tom. “The Story Of Charlie Parker’s ‘Ko Ko’,” NPR Weekend Edition Sunday, Aug. 27, 2000.